Note 60 — Chapter X

George's Northumberland "burr" was so strong that it rendered him almost unintelligible to persons who were unfamiliar with it; and he had even thoughts of going to school again, for the purpose, if possible, of getting rid of it. In the year 1823, when Stephenson was forty-two years of age, we find his friend Thomas Richardson, of Lombard Street, writing to Samuel Thoroughgood, a schoolmaster at Peckham, as follows: "Dear Friend,—My friend George Stephenson, a man of first-rate abilities as an engineer, but of little or no education, wants to consult thee or some other person to see if he can not improve himself—he has so much Northumberland dialect, etc. He will be at my house on sixth day next, about five o'clock, if thou could make it convenient to see him. Thy assured friend, Thos. Richardson."